Re: "elevating" ("improving") folk music

[robert wiener <wiener...>]

Robert,

Do you have any personal favorites of what you consider successful
classical works using Jewish musical themes?

Bob

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Cohen <rlcm17 (at) hotmail(dot)com>
To: World music from a Jewish slant <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
Date: Wednesday, January 05, 2000 4:18 PM
Subject: Re: "elevating" ("improving") folk music


>That's exactly what the Society for Jewish Folk Music in
turn-of-the-century
>Russia (I think I have name and time right--not near my books) sought
to do:
>  "elevate" (by its lights) folk music into "art music."  FWIW, I
share
>Joshua's distaste for that ethos and aesthetic--passionately.  But I
think
>some such transformations or incorporations of folk music "work,"
probably
>because the composer respected and did not demean the original:
Vaughan
>Williams' ENGLISH FOLK SONG SUITE, for example, and some of Bartok.
Maybe
>APPALCHIAN SPRING, too, and I'm sure there are other successful
examples. --
>Robert Cohen
>
>
>>From: Joshua Horowitz <horowitz (at) styria(dot)com>
>>Reply-To: jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org
>>To: World music from a Jewish slant <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
>>Subject: Re: Meaning of "Klezmer"
>>Date: Tue, 04 Jan 2000 17:35:34 +0100
>>
>> > Josh,
>> >
>> > Which attempts to integrate klezmer music into modern
compositions are
>> > you thinking of? Bob
>>
>>I wasn't trying to be specific, but was more taking a definite, very
>>opinionated standpoint about the effort as such for myself. I won't
>>single out any compositions I've heard, in spite of having been
asked
>>ocassionally to write reviews. I feel too jaded to trust my own
opinion
>>on a public platform outside of the realm of a discussion like this.
But
>>I think my main qualm about using folk music for the basis of
*serious
>>music* is an implicit meaning that the serious music world is
>>*improving* upon the music of the *natives*. I've never been able to
>>hear a derivative composition without getting past that reaction.
Maybe
>>my ears are clogged though, I don't know. Josh
>>
>>
>
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